Casinos and other gambling establishments use conventional playing cards for playing a number of card games for example blackjack and poker. Usually a number of decks of playing cards are provided at each gaming table with the cards being either shuffled by hand or by machine prior to being dealt to the players. One problem encountered in this conventional arrangement is that the effectiveness of the shuffle depends upon the skill of the dealer or the efficiency of the card shuffling machine to ensure that cards dealt are arranged randomly and this is often impossible or very difficult to achieve. Further as a finite number of cards are used in the decks that are shuffled, a problem of card counting can arise in that skilled individuals can count the cards being dealt to relatively accurately predict the next card to be dealt. Particular cards can also be susceptible to being marked which leads to potential cheating. A further disadvantage of the known arrangements is that a large number of decks of cards are used and decks of cards are required to be regularly replaced which leads to a substantial cost to the gambling establishment.
Gaming cards carrying pre-printed material such as bingo cards are also used for playing gambling games in gambling or other establishments. Such cards usually have a one-off use and thus are required to be discarded after use. Other games use playing pieces or other tokens which carry an identifying marking with the pieces or tokens being dealt to a player and the player gambling in accordance with the piece or token received and/or expected to be received. Such games encounter the same disadvantages outlined above in relation to playing card games.